A bit Radiohead-heavy I thought, but not entirely unexpected. OK Computer…well deserved. Kid A…dunno, that album (aside from Idioteque) loses something each time I've listened to it in recent years. I think it's one of those cases where experimental fell a little to the unfocused side of the fence. I like Hail to the Thief tons more.

Fucking Arcade Fire. Ugh.

Strokes, Wilco, Sufjan…..*yawn* Now that I'm reviewing this list again, I'm realizing a lot of the top 20 leaves me feeling rather cold. I suppose it's all albums that appealed to a very broad spectrum of people.

But "they" are people who voted. People don't get voting right as such as it isn't a collective decision. Pitchfork just added it up (and did other data stuff). Unless pitchfork gave Chloe Sevigny extra votes, it is just what individuals think stacked up in piles.

Having said that, using phrases like "best years for music" is problematic. The year and even the choices are by no means the "best". More realistically, "preferred" is a better word choice and "coinciding time frames".

It is unsurprising that the number of albums from recent years outweighs the older stuff. Only one Stereolab album appears but if you had asked people around 2001, I would assume that all three albums from 1996 on would get a nod.

Note also that nothing from Broadcast gets in yet many regard Tender Buttons as a masterpiece. To me, it seems extraordinary that "artists" like the Streets could have released albums better than Broadcast.

I also find it extraordinary that QOTSA's third record ranked higher than their unranked, vastly superior début or Beirut's first record was not ranked higher than the forgettable second one.

But that is democracy for you. Tony Abbott could become PM of my country and he cannot even answer the most basic questions that are put to him by a B Grade interviewer. Coke is the #1 and #2 seller in supermarkets here but it is just sugary junk. In the end, most people choose beer, not because it is better than ecstasy but because it is comfortable.

Anyway, I think the list has some good and bad. There are definitely some brilliant records (Odelay [but how on Earth could Midnight Vultures get in? I haven't heard anybody anywhere play that pink, postmodern, pretentious falsetto nightmare since its release], the Bjork ones, Music has a right to children, Illinois, This is it, Ketchup, You are free, Emergency and I and more)